Gun Control Gets Boost In House

May 26, 1999|By JANET HOOK Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — House Republican leaders on Tuesday announced their support for the gun control measures passed last week in the Senate, boosting chances that the legislation -- once considered a longshot -- will become law.

Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and other GOP leaders embraced the gun-control proposals -- including new background checks for purchases at gun shows and mandatory safety devices for handguns -- and promised they would come before the House in mid-June.

But Democrats, trying to stay on the offensive on the issue, clamored for action on the measures this week, before Congress begins a week-long Memorial Day recess. They accused Hastert of dragging his feet to give the gun lobby time to generate opposition.

"The speaker is stalling," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn. "We could pass these bills in a heartbeat if the Republican leadership would just bring them to the floor."

Still, barring a major reversal, the endorsement of Hastert and two Judiciary Committee leaders -- Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., and Rep. Bill McCollum, R-Fla. -- makes it more likely that the House, once considered a black hole for gun-control initiatives, will approve a bill similar to the Senate's.

"We will expedite this legislation, but we will not force it through the system without the proper consideration of the Judiciary Committee," Hastert said.

In stating their support for the proposals, House Republicans clearly are trying to avoid the kind of freewheeling, unpredictable debate the Senate had earlier this month, when GOP leaders seemed caught flat-footed by the strength of gun-control forces in the emotional aftermath of the massacre at a high school in Littleton, Colo.

"We are going to be much more deliberate than the Senate," said McCollum, who is running for the Senate in 2000.

At issue is juvenile justice legislation to crack down on youth violence. It was heavily amended by Democrats in the Senate to include measures that seek to keep guns out of the hands of children and criminals.

Hastert opened Tuesday's session of the House with a speech promising floor action on gun proposals by mid-June. Hyde and McCollum then announced that they would hold a hearing on the issue on Thursday and in early June would draft legislation that would include Senate proposals to require background checks at gun shows, safety devices for handguns, and bans on the import of large ammunition clips and on juvenile possession of assault weapons.

The GOP leaders said the bill also would contain some yet-to-be drafted provisions to crack down on the "culture of violence," like the Senate's provisions aimed at curbing violence in the entertainment industry.

"We have witnessed in the last 25 years a coarsening of American life," Hyde said. "There is waning respect for human dignity and new contempt for authority."

Democratic gun control advocates plan to turn up the heat on Republicans to act this week by trying to offer gun control amendments to unrelated bills on the House floor; by voting against adjourning for Memorial Day unless gun control measures have been acted on; and by collecting signatures on a petition to force those provisions out of committee onto the floor. But none of those steps will succeed unless some Republicans cross party lines, and none have indicated they will.

Antipathy to gun control has always been stronger in the House, where some 179 members received campaign contributions from the NRA in 1997-98.